Once Upon A Time Interview: Josh Dallas On What’s Coming Up For Charming

Spoiler warning: Story elements from the first two episodes of Once Upon A Time Season 3 are discussed within.

We recently visited the Vancouver studio of Once Upon A Time — you can read some of our other interviews from the set here — and with a new episode scheduled for this Sunday, October 13, it seems as good of a time as any to start posting some more interviews over the weekend.

Today’s interview subject is Josh Dallas, whose “Prince Charming” David found himself infected by the “dram shade” in last week’s show, “Lost Girl.” This infection will be a “huge secret” that David will be keeping for several episodes.

“As we know, dream shade is a nasty, nasty thing,” Dallas explains, “so he’s going to have a very large secret on his mind, and he’s going to keep that from everyone. The great thing about this first half of the season, for everyone and particularly David, now that we go forward, is what that does to his integrity, and how he then compromises his integrity. And through what means does he compromise his integrity? What’s great about this first half of the season is that we all have this common goal, to get Henry, and we all have these obstacles, which are really ourselves, and Peter Pan, of course. It’s about how he goes forward with this, and how he’s going to get out of it. It’s going to continue over a few episodes. It’s bad news. It’s real bad news.”

While at first glance it may seem that David hiding a secret will have parallels with what Mary-Margaret went through in Season 2, Dallas points out that the situation is actually a bit different. “He doesn’t go dark, at least not yet,” he says. “We haven’t seen that yet, so it’s not quite a parallel in that way. But I think it definitely questions how he handles it. I go back to his integrity. Does he share it with Mary-Margaret? Does he not? If he doesn’t, why doesn’t he? What’s he trying to achieve, and how does that hurt the people around him? In many ways, it’s kind of like the first season. We’re all trying to get back individually to being completely complete people, of who we really are, and that’s what Neverland is really going to challenge in everyone, because Neverland is about belief. So it’s about believing in who you are, and it’ll test that with everyone, particularly David,” Josh explains.

Neverland is also a place where the characters will be forced to grow. “We have heroes, villains, a wizard, a savior — all of these people are together, and we’re all going toward this one common thing, to get Henry, so we’re all going to have to find ways in order to come together to get this done, and that can only force you to grow in all kinds of ways. I think every character will go for that,” he says, although some characters aren’t going to immediately get along on this journey.

“Regina does not want to go camping with the Charmings at all. She hates it. It’s like the worst people ever that she would ever want to be with, but you know, it’s interesting,” he tells us. “The dynamic is [that] the Charmings don’t trust her. Why would they trust her? She’s tried to kill them many, many times, but they have retaliated and tried to kill her many, many times, or at least David has tried to a few times. So, there’s definitely trust issues. We’ll see how those develop. Everybody has their own view on how to do something. What’s the right way to go forward in getting Henry back? So, it’s all about compromise. It’s the biggest dysfunctional family you’ve ever seen in your life trying to compromise with each other, so there are going to be sparks, for sure.”

Dallas acknowledges that the circumstances of the island might form some new alliances. “All of these characters are leaders in their own right. They all had very different specific ideas of how to do something. Hook is a veteran of Neverland, so he’s going to know things about the island that certainly David doesn’t know. So, at times he’s going to have to stand back and listen to that, and who knows? Maybe as we go forward, maybe they come together and there’s the greatest, most beautiful bromance you’ve ever seen in your life,” he says, setting off what is sure to be a round of Tumblr quote sharing.

Josh Dallas ultimately hopes that David will get his happy ending, but who knows when that will be? First, though, there is the mission at hand. “There are still a lot of obstacles to get over in Neverland, and Peter Pan is a major one,” he says.

Once Upon A Time Season 3 airs Sunday nights at 8PM (ET) on ABC. See some images from this week’s episode!